Wednesday, April 26, 2017

who gets the job of pushing the knob...?

All of the progress for the last three days has been 'behind the scenes'...I've always been bothered by the fact that I don't have an inventory of my parts or really know where they are beyond 'somewhere on the property'.  Being that I worked in inventory control for so long, you'd think I'd translate those skills to my own stuff - but like the car mechanic that drives a total shitbox, it hadn't been a priority to improve the situation.  The situation where I attempted the brake installation and have had to order just about everything in spite of my rather extensive collection of parts...got me to fundamentally realize that it was time that I take an inventory, create locations and get this stuff organized.

For the past week or so I've been cataloging all of my parts, their condition and cost along with a location (to put like items together for starters...).  I'm well over 600 lines at this point and I'm about 1/2 way through the parts.  There's a decent amount of stuff that I won't get to for quite a while, if ever.  I'm learning a bit along the way - having to look a lot of it up in the parts book - and discovering parts that I don't need (too early or late for my car) and parts that I have purchased a few too many times.  My upcoming engine build has already influenced how many early parts I decide to keep - I'm already letting go of early parts I won't use.

The goals for this project are akin to the layers of an onion.  

Layer 1: Identify what I've got and where it's stored.  This is proving to be the thickest and toughest layer to penetrate.  In the process I'm also creating labels and bagging/tagging parts so it's taking longer than it might if I wasn't being so anal.  I've also spent hours rearranging the garage to consolidate the storage areas for parts.

Layer 2: Group items together by location on the car - not necessarily by part group - so that when I go to put the car back together, I'll have the parts for a given area, like the doors, together.  I also think this will allow me to more readily identify parts that are missing or in excess.

Layer 3: Sell excess or non-applicable parts (this will happen parallel to Layer 1's evolution)

Layer 4: Identify and seek out the 'missing' parts (if there are any at this point).  I know of a handful of parts that I would like to find but that's about it.  I'm already skipping opportunities to buy/squirrel away parts that I've already got.  Hard to do - although I need to get some control over what is slowly growing too large.

I may get back into the brakes tomorrow - I need a break from all of the computer work for a bit.  Maybe I can get the brakes done, start the alignment and at least get the car washed...I would love to take it out for a drive soon.

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